Twenty counties have reached the last eight in the past 12 years, meaning a sense of achievement spread around the country, writes SEÁN MORAN

IT HAS been arguably the most significant reform within the football championship.

The advent of All-Ireland quarter-finals became necessary when the qualifier format was first adopted in 2000, as there had to be some level at which provincial champions were introduced to meet those counties who had come through the parallel competition between those who had been beaten in their province.

The initiative was accepted only on a probationary, two-year basis but GAA director general Páraic Duffy, who chaired the Inter-county Work Group which devised the format, accurately foresaw at the time there would be no going back.

“My own feeling would be that once you go down the road of change whatever happens in two years’ time, it’s highly unlikely we’ll be back to where you are now. I think we’re into an inevitable period of change and I’m happy with what happened today.”

The consequence has been to create an elite championship within a championship. It is the ambition of every county to progress to the August weekend. For the serious contenders, anything less would be a disaster and it is the period in which they aim to start going up the gears, finding something extra to generate decisive momentum.

Speaking presciently before the 2009 championship, which Kerry won through the qualifiers, former All-Ireland winning captain Dara Ó Cinnéide said of the upcoming provincial semi-final: “Kerry would like to beat Cork on June 7th. It’s a big game but they won’t see losing it as the end of the world. The way they look at it, the championship starts with the (All-Ireland) quarter-finals.”

For other counties the mere fact of being present is evidence of a successful season and a promising sign for a team’s development. Twenty counties have reached the last eight in the past 12 seasons, which has meant the opportunity and sense of achievement has been spread around the country.

The expanded championship has greatly enhanced the promotional value of the All-Ireland and also created a valuable revenue stream with big crowds attending the quarter-finals.

Ironically the sense of occasion created by the matches taking place at Croke Park, generally on two double bills, which has become the norm since the inaugural year of 2001 when four different venues were used, was not part of the original blueprint.

The Inter-county Work Group, which devised the proposals, originally envisaged the provincial champions having home advantage in the All-Ireland quarter-finals but the special congress of October 2000 rejected this.

Instead of having an advantage going into the All-Ireland quarter-finals, provincial champions feel vulnerable, as they’re playing teams who have established a winning momentum and have learned from the defeat they sustained earlier in the season.

Tyrone and Dublin have in recent years brought proposals to congress to extend second chances to the four counties that don’t get them, the provincial champions.

Interestingly the quarter-finals have proved the most likely stage for defending All-Ireland champions to get eliminated.

This has happened four times in the 11 years of the new format, including the last two which saw Cork and Kerry surprised by Mayo and Down respectively.

Psychologically the safety net of the qualifiers has been removed and any flaws have gone largely unpunished but that changes in the quarter-finals.

“No matter how well champions start the season,” former Kerry manager Pat O’Shea told this newspaper earlier in the year, “there comes a stage where for whatever reason the team underperforms. Everything can be going really well but then there comes this really average performance and managers will say: ‘We never saw it coming.’”

The sense of excitement is created by both the possibility of shocks but also the novelty of matches between teams that have sometimes never played in championship, as with next weekend when Kerry play Donegal in one of the most eagerly awaited quarter-finals ever.

Originally the idea had to survive an anti-climactic first season. When the quarter-final draw was recorded in 2001, the GAA were horrified to see that apart from the first Kerry-Dublin championship meeting in 16 years, the remaining ties were reruns of matches that already taken place in the provinces: Meath-Westmeath, Derry-Tyrone and Roscommon-Galway – a major disappointment for all those who had been waiting for new and enticing pairings.

It was even considered the draw might be substituted by a recorded rehearsal before more cautious counsel pointed out that word would inevitably get out and future draws would be badly compromised.

Sometimes the sensation comes on the double. On August 7th 2004, Fermanagh, one of only two counties without even a provincial title, reached a first All-Ireland semi-final by defeating Armagh, one of the top teams in the country – finalists and winners in the previous two years respectively.

In the next match All-Ireland champions Tyrone were swept out by a Ciarán McDonald-inspired Mayo.

On this day two years ago, Kerry went in defending the All-Ireland against a Down side in the county’s first quarter-final.

Despite a couple of key suspensions in the Kerry camp and the Ulster county’s impeccable championship record in the fixture, the champions still started the game as raging 10 to 3 on favourites.

Down made a storming start and Kerry couldn’t get back into the game.

Later in the evening Dublin came in at 9 to 4 against Ulster champions Tyrone and sealed an unexpected triumph with a late Eoghan O’Gara goal.

This weekend brings one of the most eagerly anticipated set of quarter-finals in the 12 years of the format and with it the most open All-Ireland race in living memory.